


worship the ashes

by Huzuzu470



Series: in the margins [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: (Ish) - Freeform, (only a very little amount), Angst, Canon Compliant, Comfort, Heavy Angst, M/M, Spoilers, Trans Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Trans Male Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:21:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28336062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huzuzu470/pseuds/Huzuzu470
Summary: five years. five years he’d kept it a secret in the corps.
Relationships: Levi/Erwin Smith
Series: in the margins [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2097780
Comments: 9
Kudos: 125





	worship the ashes

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [capture the wild things and bring them in line](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27793273) by [translevi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/translevi/pseuds/translevi). 



> [song here!](https://youtu.be/crq-qc_r6Jk)  
> 
> 
>   
> (i got inspired by a trans levi fic and im trans. truly, a coinkidoink to revel in.)

sometimes, levi still catches himself.

it’s a simple action, taking out the white button-down from the back of his closet. if he inhales deeply enough, he can still smell where erwin’s scent lingers, tucked in around the neck, the quiet reassurance as though erwin were sitting next to him. he wraps it around himself, smothers his nose in the crevasses and breathes it in. 

in half an hour, he’ll probably find the energy to undo the pin from the right arm and slip the damn thing over his shoulders — or better still, shove it away again, deep behind all his own clothes. but for now, he sits still, the fabric wrapped awkwardly around his torso, and feels the weight rise in his chest again at the thought of him being gone.

erwin is gone. and levi isn’t.

— 

the first time they’d fucked, they had both been drunk. excessively so, in fact — erwin had repeatedly insisted that levi was too far gone, that it wouldn’t be right for him to take advantage of levi’s state. he’d allowed himself to be shoved back to his office all the same, his hands tangled in levi’s straight hair, heel catching on the frame and sending them both stumbling through the door, locking it closed behind them.

“you’re not taking advantage,” levi had hissed, had bitten a red trail down erwin’s neck, well above the line of what the military uniform would cover the next day. in the morning, levi knows that erwin will likely stand in front of the mirror, will run his hands over them and wonder what the blotchy marks meant. “i’m a grown man. i can make my own decisions.”

all the time lost, the stolen glances, the years of quiet wondering, seem to come crashing down as erwin drags him closer, fills a hollow in levi’s chest that he had long forgotten existed. there’s no other man he would follow so willingly, no other man he would let toss him against the bedframe, pull him in like this.

or at least — levi had _expected_ everything to be desperate. he’d expected erwin to throw him down, to take him with the rush and impatience that years of denying themselves would bring. instead, he found his gaze met with erwin’s, something pained and longing to it, a different beast entirely, cupping his neck as levi leans into him.

“all these years,” erwin says. “you could have told me.” he runs a hand over levi’s body, palm hot against his skin.

“fuck off.” levi swats it away, scoffs lightly. “like you couldn’t have said anything yourself.” the words held no heat, and the quiet gaze he’d been met with in response to them had been so regretful that a small rush of guilt boils through him from head to toe almost immediately after they drop from his mouth.

“i know,” erwin breathes back, tone heavy. “i know.”

the slow kiss that meets his lips a moment later is drawn out, soft. something erwin seemed to want to savor, tongue flicking over levi’s lips as he deepens it, lays levi down gently on the cheap, military-issue mattress. levi’s own limbs, hardened by a decade of training, go completely pliant under erwin’s touch, fingers knotted into the cloth at his back. he can smell the sandalwood of erwin’s cologne lingering, mixed with the sharp scent of ink, trace evidence of a meeting he’d been in before they’d started drinking for the night.

the buttons of erwin’s shirt come undone deliberately, muddy-brown scar across his chest where the buckle of the 3dmg belt dug into his flesh, pockmarked with dozens of other flecks and gashes around it. levi’s own skin bears the same mark, under the soft white of his clothes. he's stared at the line in the mirror often, watched as how over time, it faded from the fresh, angry red of a new recruit to something more sombre, skin adjusting to the constant wear and tear that the gear brought. his eyes trace the same line now, but from the bed as erwin’s blue eyes drink up the sight in front of him, of levi splayed across his sheets, broad curve of his shoulders outlined in the dim candlelight. 

"i never wanted to overstep with you," erwin whispers, meant more as an admission to himself, levi suspects. he presses his lips to where the steady beat of levi's heart echoes against his ribs, head dipping ever so slowly downwards. "i'd only hoped —"

his fingers slip under the waistband of levi's pants, and levi grabs the offending hand abruptly.

“promise me this changes nothing,” levi had sputtered, the words off-kilter. if erwin didn't know him better, they might even have sounded afraid. his eyebrows furrow in surprise, a tight little notch forming between them.

but erwin does know him, and they're terrified.

“levi, if this is about intimacy —” he'd started, but was cut off before he could finish. the words had been a ghost on erwin's lips, so quiet levi could hardly make them out over the pounding of his own heart.

he doesn’t understand, levi thinks to himself. but he would.

“promise me.”

erwin pauses, and levi can practically see gears cranking inside his skull as he turns the idea over, belligerent frown creasing his brow, before letting out a tiny little sigh of concession. his head drops slightly, a nod of acknowledgement, and levi's heart jumps.

"ok."

he lets himself fall back against the sheets. squeezes his eyes closed and wiggles his hips upwards to let erwin’s hands slide his pants off. there's a tight inhale of air a moment later, erwin putting the pieces together in a matter of seconds.

“levi,” he’d repeated, firmer, more solid. any other man wouldn’t notice the hitch in his voice, the way erwin’s weight shifts almost imperceivably, even though levi can still feel the heavy outline of erwin's cock pressed up against his leg. “you’re —”

“a man,” he interrupts. his face feels hot, childish embarrassment seeping all the way down to his bones, stubborn insistence on his lips. “i’m a man.”

five years. five years he’d kept it a secret in the corps.

erwin had clicked his tongue against his teeth, sucked in another breath of air through them. his hands fall on levi’s waist again, feels the outline of his body as though he's observing a work of art, thumbs finding the little indent and slotting around his waist. a small breath tickles the trail of hair that grows there when erwin places his lips to the pale skin of his stomach.

“of course this means nothing, levi,” he says gently, as though levi might break under his words if he were too careless. as though he wasn’t just humanity’s strongest. in an instant, the tight little ball of stress seemed to melt from inside levi’s gut.

then erwin had pressed down on him, had kissed his way back up to levi’s face, undone levi's shirt and traced the outline of his chest, crooked his fingers inside him until levi had moaned his name. his body curled over levi’s, _inside_ levi’s, the push and drag of his cock the only thing still tethering him in place, and levi rides it out, feels the satisfaction burn its way deep into his core like a wild animal, alive and _demanding_. 

—

“stay,” erwin had asked him when it was over, their legs tangled together, still naked. levi wanted to say no, wanted to tell him it would be suspicious. 

for a long time, he hadn't moved. he’d focused on the feeling of erwin against him, before he’d rolled over carefully and looked down at him. “you know they'll talk.”

there’d been a beat, an odd cluster of seconds, and a slow nod. and then, erwin repeated himself anyways. “stay.”

hours later, after the candle had burnt out, he’d feel erwin’s hands run curious little paths across the scars on his chest, never once commenting on them. he seems to understand the lack of explanation, reads levi easily enough to not pry.

an untamed, raw kind of exhilaration bubbled in his ribs as he'd stared at the ceiling, heart racing. next to him, erwin drifted to sleep, eyes freed from their perpetual severity. there must have been dozens of nights where levi would knock on his door and find erwin passed out at his desk, but he’d never before seen him so fully at ease, breaths deep and even, hair draped over the pillowcase, shoved crookedly to one side. it’s a display of vulnerability levi will come to know as his own, over the years, a moment only he is privy to in the commander’s life. 

their clothes were still heaped on the floor the next day, erwin’s arm curled around him, early morning light creeping its fingers through the curtains. it caught the small freckles and whitened flecks of erwin’s skin, pinked the conch of his ear and fanned over the muscled curve of his back. levi had spent a few, painfully short minutes there, had brushed the hair from his eyes and pressed a soft, quiet kiss to erwin’s temple before he’d dressed and slipped out of the office, brain muddy from the alcohol of the night before.

he’d gone back to his room, undressed with the intention of taking a shower, but ended up in front of his mirror instead, run his own hands over the scars on his chest and thought quietly about the promise he’d demanded.

erwin had never once mentioned it again, not to levi or anyone else.

now, in the dark of his own office, years later, he makes the same small gesture again, reaches up to his chest that still lacks sensation in some parts, runs his fingers along the ridged scars that crease it. numbly, levi wonders if the shirt he wears now, hands swallowed up by the sleeves, is the same one that erwin had worn that night. 

it doesn’t really matter much, he supposes, doesn’t really change anything. but the thought creeps in nonetheless, the same way levi has never been able to admit what real feelings may have existed under it all, the ones they had both acknowledged and yet never spoken aloud. he’s fairly certain that erwin hadn’t slept with anyone _but_ levi since that night. they’d never had an agreement on exclusivity, it had just sort of, — _happened_ , he supposes. he’d never wanted anyone else. whether that meant their interactions were something more than convenience is irrelevant.

still, when he finally slides the shirt off again, a fleck of black catches his eye. the fabric catches between his fingers, regular-grade soldier’s uniform, not silk like all the other commanders wore. there’s an inkstain near the elbow of the sleeve, on the left-hand side. it’s likely the result of when erwin was relearning how to write with his non-dominant hand. 

after the return from shiganshina, it had fallen to levi to clean out the room that used to be his office. he could have delegated the task to someone else. but he doesn’t, because it's erwin, and levi admires him more than any other man. because he'd never met anyone he'd been willing to follow so far before, and he figures that taking care of what used to belong to him is the least he can do now. and, although he’d never admit it aloud, because he wanted to be the last to see erwin’s room, his life frozen on the desk in the form of messy paperwork, as though he might still walk through the door any moment. he’d stolen the shirt then, left forgotten on the back of erwin's chair before the expedition. had lifted it once to sniff it, inhaled and found it still smelled like him. a relic, from past the grave.

it takes levi less than twenty seconds in the silence of the empty office, the fabric still balled up against his nose, to conclude that he should have broken his legs like he'd promised to, kept him off his stupid horse. the rest of humanity may well be damned, and it wouldn't matter. erwin wouldn't be dead.

but he hadn't. and erwin is.

he drapes it over the hanger bitterly, resentful that he’d so willingly left levi behind for the one place levi couldn't follow, and shoves it back into the closet without another thought.


End file.
